What moves the price of a heat pump
We will not invent a number for a house nobody has looked at, but here is exactly what changes it.
Five things that move the number
Every quote you get is these five, priced. If two quotes are far apart, one of them has read one of these differently.
The size and shape of the house
Not the square footage on the assessment, the heat load: insulation, windows, ceiling height, how the rooms sit. Two 1,800 sq. ft. houses on the same street can need different systems.
Ducts, or no ducts
A house with sound ductwork can take a central system and one indoor unit. A house without takes heads, and every head is equipment, refrigerant line and labour.
How many rooms have to be warm
One head in the living room is a different job from four heads covering bedrooms on two floors. This is usually the biggest single swing in a quote.
What the electrical panel can carry
Older Oceanside houses often have a panel with nothing spare. A service upgrade is real money and it is electrical work, not HVAC work, so it shows up as its own line.
Taking the old system out
Removing a furnace, a tank or an old air handler takes time and disposal. Some rebates require the removal and proof of it, so it is not optional if you want the money.
There is a sixth for anyone counting on a rebate: the installer has to be registered with the program, and a whole-home rebate needs a heat load calculation to CSA F280-12 and the summary form that goes with it.
The panel is the one that surprises people
A heat pump is an electrical appliance with a dedicated circuit. On a house that was built around baseboards, or one that has picked up a hot tub and a car charger since, there is often nothing spare in the panel. Finding that out on install day is how a job goes sideways.
So we look at the panel before we price the job. If a service upgrade is needed, you hear it while you are still deciding, as its own line.
What the rebates take off the end
These are maximums, read off the official pages, not estimates.
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If the house is electrically heated, up to $4,000 comes off a whole-home heat pump, or $1,500 off a partial system.
Home Renovation Rebate, at any income. A bonus of up to $1,000 runs on work completed, invoiced and paid by October 31, 2026, with the application in by November 30, 2026.
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If the address is in an RDN Electoral Area, $2,000 comes off a switch away from natural gas, oil or propane.
Homes in Parksville, Qualicum Beach, Nanaimo and Lantzville do not qualify.
Income-qualified households are in a different program with larger amounts. All of these rebates need the heat pump installed by a contractor registered with the program. Griffin Refrigeration is not registered with CleanBC Better Homes, so none of them is available on a heat pump we install today, and our quotes price the work without a rebate.
What it costs to run
This is where most heat pump pages start inventing numbers. We are not going to.
What a heat pump costs to run depends on the rates you pay, what you are heating with now, how warm you keep the house and how the winter behaves. A percentage saving quoted on a web page has none of that in it.
BC Hydro publishes a heat pump cost calculator on the same page as the rebates. It uses their rates and your inputs, which makes it a better answer than anything we could put here.
How we put a number together
We look at the house: what heats it now, the insulation and the windows, where the heads or the ducts would run, and what the panel can carry. The heat load gets worked out room by room, because that is what sizes the system.
The equipment gets named and the work gets described, so you can see exactly what you are paying for. Ask every contractor you talk to for the make and model on the quote. It takes two minutes to check it against the CleanBC qualifying product list, and it is the difference between a rebate and a story about a rebate.
Cost questions we get
Why is there no price on this page?
How much is a heat pump for a 2,000 sq ft house?
What is included when you quote a heat pump?
Is it cheaper to repair the furnace instead?
Where the rebate figures come from
The prices are not on this page, so the only numbers to source are the rebates.
- BC Hydro, heat pump rebates and cost calculator
$4,000 whole home, $1,500 partial, the bonus of up to $1,000 for work completed, invoiced and paid between August 1 and October 31, 2026 with a complete application submitted by November 30, 2026, and the calculator linked above.
- CleanBC Better Homes, Home Renovation Rebate requirements
Homes over 1,200 sq. ft. must install a multi-split or central system, and a whole-home rebate requires a CSA F280-12 heat load calculation and summary form.
- Regional District of Nanaimo, Fossil Fuel to Heat Pump Rebate
$2,000 in the Electoral Areas, with the four municipalities excluded.
Read this before you sign
Which rebate applies to your house
Electric, fossil fuel and income-qualified, with the amount and the date it was checked.
ReadRepair or replace
How we decide whether a system is worth another visit or a changeover.
ReadHow we quote
What goes into a number before we hand it to you, and what we will not do.
ReadWhat the visit produces, since this page will not
The heat load, room by room
Insulation, windows, ceiling height and how the rooms sit. That is what sizes the system, so it comes before the price.
The panel, read before the price
Whether the electrical service has anything spare, and what a service upgrade would cost if it does not. It is electrical work, so it shows as its own line rather than disappearing into a total.
The make and model, written down
So you can look the unit up yourself, and so the invoice names exactly what went in.
Get a number for your own house
One visit covers the heating you have now, the panel and the layout, and ends in a quote. We reply within 24 hours.